Two days ago, I wrote a forum post about the Lightning Network at viewtopic.php?f=11&t=3728. I didn't think the post was particularly poignant or that it stated something that wasn't already obvious.

Apparently, Michael Marquadt (theymos) did, because it seems a pretty strange coincidence my E-Mail inbox received a lot of "Deleted Post" messages from his bitcointalk.org forums the next day. The posts got me to thinking about how he and many Core members seem to be waging a one-sided war, continuing a battle that ended a long time ago. Their sole goal seems to be spending their days curating the Internet to make sure that no remotely sensible discussion about the bitcoin network's limitations occurs, and being as rude and vindictive as possible towards anyone who disagrees with them. They are so laser-focused that they take actions that are obviously against their own interests. Meanwhile, the people they see as opponents have largely moved on, caring little about a subject they see as settled.

I read through some of the posts that were deleted. Except for a few, I made all of them in 2014. Strangely, none of the posts in the E-Mail that I looked through had any mention of bitcoin's blocksize. For example, there's this one discussing whether to buy ASICs:

Quote from: Bitcoins101 on August 27, 2014, 06:32:47 PM
Don't mine, don't start a business, don't buy into altcoins; just buy bitcoins. You'll come out further ahead than you would by getting fancy.
This is probably the best advice here.
Though I am running a mining pool, even I will say that mining is a losing proposition unless you can get ASICs early. To do that, you have to take an enormous risk of loss from all the fraudulent companies that don't deliver or delay delivery beyond the promised date. If the odds of the company not delivering are 75%, then you need to multiply the price of each ASIC by 1.75 when doing your profitability calculations. The only way to make mining profitable is to be on the inside with ASIC manufacturers.
Starting a business is only a good idea if you are unemployed, or you live in a country where taxes are higher to provide good social services (like in Europe). In the United States, it was never a good idea to start a business until health insurance for preexisting conditions became available this year (because everyone has at least one problem). Even now, businessmen don't get 401(k) or 403(b) plans. The average businessman makes about $25k. The irony is that people who are most likely to be unemployed are also the least likely to be successful at business because the same skills are necessary to do well at any job.
Buying altcoins is not a way to invest in bitcoins, but it can be profitable. Litecoins are very cheap right now and unlike newer currencies like darkcoins, litecoins have wide adoption in the exchanges. In order to buy other altcoins, you need litecoins. People who say that litecoins are doomed due to a "lack of innovation" are mistaken. Just like bitcoins, litecoins have a "network effect" because they are the first altcoin, and their low value makes them useful for microtransactions (like buying many of the brand new coins worth less than 1 satoshi). During every bubble, litecoins lag behind bitcoins and provide a greater return.

Quote from: jonnybravo0311 on August 25, 2014, 10:20:45 PM
P2Pool actually has the opposite problem than most other pools. In your "typical" mining pool, the more hash rate the pool has, the smaller the effect of variance on the individual miner. In p2pool, the more hash rate the pool has, the larger the effect of variance on the individual miner. This is because of the nature of the share chain inherent in p2pool mining. For example, as of right now, p2pool has about 3PH/s on it. If you've got an Antminer S3, you can expect it to take over a day to find a single share to get you on the chain for payout.
I suspect that P2Pool will not be looked at as a "pool" for very much longer. As its hashrate grows, we are already starting to see "pools" built on top of P2Pool. Eventually, P2Pool will gain a significant share of the hashrate, but since miners win shares so infrequently, it will not be feasible for people to solo-mine against P2Pool anymore.
This will spur the creation of a "new P2Pool," which is a second distributed P2Pool built on top of the original P2Pool that uses the same exact technology but has more frequent block times. This is one way that faster confirmations can eventually be achieved without any fork at all, because it will be possible to see which transactions are being included in the "new P2Pool" and the original P2Pool's blocks. As a transaction gets included in a P2Pool up the chain, you can be more confident it will be included in the top-level blockchain.

and here's another post where someone asked for a Gamecredits block explorer and we set one up:

Quote from: Alcuino on July 22, 2016, 12:40:39 AM
GMC have a blockchain explorer like other currencies? a link?
There is one at https://prohashing.com/explorer/GameCredit/.

The only reason I can come up with for deleting these posts is because Marquadt must think that I valued my membership at his forums, and that deleting posts that were mostly from 2014 would somehow cause me to regret committing treason against the Core. Of course, everyone knew he owned those forums and I was one of those who stopped contributing anything of value when he split the community in August 2015. What's odd is that if he wants to remain a big player in bitcoin discussion, deleting informative posts (like the list of nodes for a coin) makes his forum contain less valuable content. When one looks at the quality of most content at bitcointalk.org, one thing his forums do not have a shortage of is one-line troll posts, so the rational thing to do is to encourage as many quality posts as possible.

Stupidly, he actually wasn't even very effective at hurting his own forums. He didn't delete the replies to these posts, and since nearly every one was quoted verbatim in a reply, none of the content is actually gone anyway. He simply made other users look like idiots, discussing things that don't exist.

This "war" isn't limited to the deletion of posts on one forum. In other instances, links I've posted on twitter end up with a large number of replies criticizing me as a person, rather than refuting the actual argument. I think that the Core has gotten me banned from reddit at least five times by reporting trivial rule violations like claiming "vote brigading" when I suggested that people upvote a post because it was informative.

The "civil war" is reported in the press as well. There were recently a few articles published in the mainstream media about the war, presenting it as if it were "tearing the currency apart." (How long has it been since people believed there was only one true cryptocurrency anyway?) Being from news magazines, they feel a need to present both sides of the argument, just as CNN often invites Republicans onto analyst panels even when their answers are absurdly detached from reality. In the articles about bitcoin, the concern isn't about presenting facts about both sides; it's finding someone who supports Bitcoin Cash and cares enough anymore about the original bitcoin to be interviewed. They often end up interviewing Gregory Maxwell twice and asking him to present the Bitcoin Cash argument and make the grand conclusion that the civil war continues, so that they can sell subscriptions.

For all the talk about a war, almost everyone who saw the need to increase bitcoin's blocksize stopped talking about it a long time ago. They didn't like the way the Core was running things, they created a new currency, and now the focus is on building uses for Bitcoin Cash. When I saw that they had decided to stick with expensive transactions, I didn't keep beating my head against the wall; we simply switched to litecoins. Meanwhile, the Core seems stuck in this perpetual battle and they want to get their way so badly that they are willing to hurt their own interests to do so. If you need proof of that, consider that if Marquadt's victims were as dogged as the Core is, Marquadt would not own his forums right now, because they would not have allowed the statute of limitations to expire on the millions of dollars of "forum donations" that are still missing almost a decade later.

In conclusion, it's just really odd to me how such an absurd amount of effort is spent by Marquadt in keeping this "war' narrative alive. The man is like an outsized version of Trump - so insecure that he repeatedly hurts himself by trying to win a victory that was already won. The battle ended last August, so if you're a Core member who hasn't noticed, everyone but you has moved on.

don't feel bad I've had a few posts deleted for no reason as well recently none from 2014 yet but a few i did make recently if i knew there was a better layedout forum that treated alt coins = to btc with as much info as there is on the Bit talk forums i wouldn't brother with them .. there Alt coins section sucks it has no sub forums etc worth searching though like the btc part does and they even moved some software to the alt-coin forum that had been in the software forums for years which made no sense and made the alt-coin part harder to look though they need to redesign those forums for sure.

I can go on for what good it will do . that said i feel you ... on there lame ass issues you know who they remind me of too trump . sadly ....an CNN often invites Republicans is bad enough to i agree but CNN is trying to be good which imo they shouldn't let those asses on there, TYT doesn't on YouTube but TYT is Progressive new not run by big money either or any of those type stations who actuality tell the truth ., don't get me going on main stream media CNN Is one of the better ones while fox is the worst one not one of the worst ones but the worst one by far .

I know i went little off topic but we have to till asshole is gone and then we need to keep it up so the people can keep control over those who's alt facts make no sense .

I'm pretty much a newbie to mining, having stayed on the sidelines too busy to do much of anything else.

My read is that following the 2017 bubble, finance houses are picking up. The market is there for the taking. BTC vs the world is one of the arguments. Ergo why 0.04 BTC as a ceiling on transactions provides some usability and removes uncertainty for those receiving coins.

Major players are now talking openly of entering the market, so expect more, not less of this sort of "gagging".

I have not looked seriously at the market as a whole, I'm not sure how much competition there is outside a view to be "top coin" vs being a collaborative effort to provide stable liquidity in the market.

In 2013 I was driving to Galveston for ThanksGiving holiday. The hype was in full force on all the radio news. "Bitcoin over 800, bitcoin over 900... so on, and so on." I was already interested and had started mining a few weeks before with a 50mh butterfly labs miner. Yes the idea of money for electricity was cool but never expected much to come of it. But 900 or 1000 per coin, gotta do this thing. And the added plus "decentralized" what, people coming together.... I'm in coz this B.S. political correctness is becoming insane.

In those early days I mined on the pool BTC Guild ans slushes I traded on coinbase and even mtGox for a short time. I even did the bitcointalk and a few other forums. To be honest I left them long ago; the noise became as insane as any other media outlet.

I agree, open debate should be left as open to all. Uncensored ideas was origanlly the idea of the internet, now most people have not seen more then 30% of it, if even. Does anyone remember when you could do real research on google? I do. Here is my point: Steve, your right it is a "one sided war" but the war is not on the alt s or any particular coin at all. It is on control. Factions all what their own brand of insights and ideas. In other words one of the unifying ideals behind btc has rotted with the corruption it wanted to overcome.

This is our nature, we need control. If we can not control the process, fools must control the systems.

nukepower wrote:don't feel bad I've had a few posts deleted for no reason as well recently none from 2014 yet but a few i did make recently if i knew there was a better layedout forum that treated alt coins = to btc with as much info as there is on the Bit talk forums i wouldn't brother with them .. there Alt coins section sucks it has no sub forums etc worth searching though like the btc part does and they even moved some software to the alt-coin forum that had been in the software forums for years which made no sense and made the alt-coin part harder to look though they need to redesign those forums for sure.

I can go on for what good it will do . that said i feel you ... on there lame ass issues you know who they remind me of too trump . sadly ....an CNN often invites Republicans is bad enough to i agree but CNN is trying to be good which imo they shouldn't let those asses on there, TYT doesn't on YouTube but TYT is Progressive new not run by big money either or any of those type stations who actuality tell the truth ., don't get me going on main stream media CNN Is one of the better ones while fox is the worst one not one of the worst ones but the worst one by far .

I know i went little off topic but we have to till asshole is gone and then we need to keep it up so the people can keep control over those who's alt facts make no sense .

nukepower wrote:don't feel bad I've had a few posts deleted for no reason as well recently none from 2014 yet but a few i did make recently if i knew there was a better layedout forum that treated alt coins = to btc with as much info as there is on the Bit talk forums i wouldn't brother with them .. there Alt coins section sucks it has no sub forums etc worth searching though like the btc part does and they even moved some software to the alt-coin forum that had been in the software forums for years which made no sense and made the alt-coin part harder to look though they need to redesign those forums for sure.

I can go on for what good it will do . that said i feel you ... on there lame ass issues you know who they remind me of too trump . sadly ....an CNN often invites Republicans is bad enough to i agree but CNN is trying to be good which imo they shouldn't let those asses on there, TYT doesn't on YouTube but TYT is Progressive new not run by big money either or any of those type stations who actuality tell the truth ., don't get me going on main stream media CNN Is one of the better ones while fox is the worst one not one of the worst ones but the worst one by far .

I know i went little off topic but we have to till asshole is gone and then we need to keep it up so the people can keep control over those who's alt facts make no sense .

cya .

The Young Turks? What absolute rubbish liars they are.

My 2 cents

Go litecoin!

let me ask you like trump ? . if you do no point in me saying any more to you and you made my point as well as the OP .point... is sad you hate the truth it must hurt .... gl you have no idea what real news is ............ with that comment sorry Steve normally I ignore these kind of trolls but they get very annoying ...